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“Uncle Rhyrand!” She perked up immediately at seeing him.
He pushed the door open and walked inside, tousling her hair. “How’re you feeling, little one? Your tummy’s giving you trouble?”
“Yeah.” She pouted.
“Don’t worry, baby. It’ll pass soon. And know what? Uncle Rhyland is gonna take Fluffy and Mittens on a walk and get you a surprise.”
He was keeping her engaged while I filled the bath and ran to the kitchen to get the Tylenol, all with puke on his foot, and for that, I was grateful. When I came back, Grav took the Tylenol, and I put her in the bath.
“I got it now.” I rubbed Rhy’s arm, smiling. “And…thank you.”
“No problem. I finally get to fulfill my potential as a toddler’s sick bag.” He hesitated, about to leave. “You want me to come back after I take the two furballs out for a walk?”
I shook my head. I honestly didn’t want him to do more than he was already doing for me. Already, he was the one pulling most of the weight in this relationship.
“Nah, I got it.”
“But you have a shift today.”
He remembers.
“I’ll call Tuckwad to help out. He needs to make himself useful at some point, right?”
That made Rhy stiffen and his jaw tense. I studied him carefully, waiting for his reaction.
“You’re not going to leave him with Grav alone, are you?”
Why do you care? I wanted to ask. Have you changed your mind about kids being the devil’s work?
“No.” I smiled instead. This was neither the time nor the place to have a big talk about our relationship and the meaning of all this. “I’m going to be here with them. I’ll call Max and tell him I can’t make it. I just think it’s a good idea for him to take care of her. Maybe those fatherly instincts will kick in.”
After Rhy left, I took Grav out of the bath, put her in new jammies, and made her tea. I made her a small fort on the couch, put on Bluey, and gave her some cuddles. Then, when I saw the Tylenol had kicked in, I excused myself to the kitchen and called Tucker.
“Yeah?” he asked, almost smugly. “Asshole dumped you, so you decided to lick your wounds with me?”
God, I hated him. He claimed to want to be a part of his child’s life until it was time to actually help out with her.
“Your daughter’s not feeling well,” I ground out between my teeth.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“Nothing is wrong with her, Tuckwad.” Screw it, I was making his nickname a thing. He’d earned it. “She caught a stomach bug slash virus. I had the same thing. It goes away in forty-eight hours, but it’s brutal.”
There was a slight pause in his response before he asked, “Do you want me to come take care of her?”
Finally, he was saying something that didn’t make me want to claw his inner organs out.
“Yes, please. I need to clean the apartment, shop for groceries, and research premed programs.”
Tucker snorted. “Yeah, right.”
I despised him. I really did.
“When can you come?” I asked, businesslike.
“In, like, maybe four hours or so. I have some stuff to do first.”
“Uh-huh. See you then.”